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December 7, 2007

Middle East News: World Press Roundup

Reuters reports on Secretary of State Rice's criticism of Israeli plans to expand the Har Homa settlement in occupied East Jerusalem (2.) In Middle East Bulletin, ATFP executive director Dajani and advocacy director Omari address the 'how and when' of engagement with Hamas (4.) A Gulf News (UAE) opinion by Damascus university lecturer Marwan Kabalan analyzes Iran's strategy in opposing the Annapolis meeting (8.) A Jordan Times (Jordan) opinion by Rami Khouri suggests that acknowledgment of Israel as a state of the Jewish people can only be a part and consequence of final status negotiations leading to Palestinian statehood (9.) Haaretz (Israel) profiles and interviews Tariq Abbas, son of Palestinian president Abbas (11.)

Condoleezza Rice criticized Israel on Friday for planning to build new homes on occupied land in the Jerusalem area -- a move Palestinians say could wreck a peace process Rice helped launch last week in Washington.
"We are in a time when the goal is to build maximum confidence with the parties and this doesn't help to build confidence," the U.S. Secretary of State said in rare public censure of Washington's closest ally in the Middle East.

The United States has voiced rare criticism of Israel, for its decision to build more homes on occupied land.
"This doesn't help build confidence," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said after meeting Israeli foreign minister Tzipi Livni in Brussels.
Israel said on Tuesday it had invited bids to build 300 new homes in Har Homa, a settlement in East Jerusalem. The Palestinians asked the US for help.
Israel says it annexed the area in 1967 and so does not regard it as occupied.

WASHINGTON - Syria is not pessimistic about US-brokered talks that had set a goal of a Israeli-Palestinian peace deal by the end of 2008, said its envoy to Washington, Imad Moustapha.
But he warned that Israel’s occupation of territories and killing of Palestinians could wreck negotiations launched at the US-sponsored peace conference in Annapolis, Maryland last month.

You are building your home. But you are having a problem with the architect, who keeps demolishing parts of the house. Sometimes he feels you did not follow the blueprints, sometimes he feels you used sub-standard materials, and sometimes, even though you are sure you followed all the instructions, he just does not like the way it turned out. You are exhausted, the costs are almost incalculable and there seems to be no end in sight.

When the Bush administration called for the Middle East peace meeting in Annapolis, Iran was, perhaps, the only country in the region that was not invited. In fact, isolating Iran was one of the key objectives of the US-sponsored gathering and was hence treated very much like a pariah.
In response, Iran developed a strategy to undermine US policy. It included several steps. At the very beginning Tehran tried to convince the Arab world not to attend the meeting.

One of the most complex and confounding elements that emerged during the run-up to the Annapolis meeting was the demand by several senior Israelis, and its parallel rejection by Palestinian officials, that the Palestinians recognise Israel as “a Jewish state” as a precondition for the start of talks.

The news from the Rafah border crossing earlier this week astounded the leaders of the Palestinian Authority (PA) in Ramallah. They had arranged with Israel to allow some 2,000 Palestinians from Gaza to go to Saudi Arabia via the Kerem Shalom and Allenby Bridge border crossings for the hajj celebrations.
But Cairo apparently had different plans. The Egyptians allowed 700 Palestinians on Monday and 1,300 on Tuesday to cross the border into Sinai, where buses were waiting to take them to Saudi Arabia.

A few months ago the host of one of America's late-night talk-shows - the ones that are off the air now because of a writers strike - cracked a joke at the expense of the European powers, in their supposed determination to halt the Iranian race toward a nuclear bomb: "France and Germany warned Iran this week not to pursue their nuclear research program. In fact, France and Germany warned Iran that if they didn't stop their program, they would, you know, warn them again," he scoffed.

Good news. Some of the more conservative American Jewish institutions are coming around to acceptance of the two-state solution, ending the occupation, and sharing Jerusalem.
It’s about time. The overwhelming majority of Israelis and Jewish Americans favor those positions and eventually the more status quo-oriented organizations had to catch up—especially now that the Israeli government asserts that it finally has a genuine Palestinian partner.